I recently sought counseling for my altoholism. I finally realized that 20 characters was enough, especially when I came up with a cool name for them.

“The 20 Twenties.”

Yup. I have Twenty characters of level 20 or higher, all bound together by a legacy too complicated for the built-in legacy chart in SWTOR. Where RP is concerned, the connections between The 20 Twenties are as complex as the webs of an Eberon spider. They include relatives, distant relatives, rivals, marriages, school relationships, partnerships, business ventures, contacts, employers, slaves, hires, underbosses and adoptions.

I call it “Casting.”

If you enter into an RP scenario with me, even if it’s just a casual BARP, chances are a conversation will rotate back to one of these connections, and if your character has connections of their own… well, we just put together a cast for our own personal episodic content. Let’s say my Trooper has a brother who knows a Jedi who can get your Smuggler’s sister out of jail. The stories will write themselves if you have multiple characters with connected backgrounds.

BUT HOW DO YOU KEEP IT ALL TOGETHER

I’ve had friends in game who shake their head at the notion of having more than two characters. They say it’s hard enough to keep the backgrounds straight on just one of them let alone twenty! Yet any time they RP with one of my characters, traits remain consistent, my characters “remember” previous conversations, and stories continue unhindered as if each character really does have a mind of their own (rather than all of them being crammed into my Swiss cheese of a brain).

Here are a few ways you can keep it all together, with some tips on making your RolePlay fresh even when you’re switching from one character to the next.

KEEPING NOTES

The most obvious answer is to simply keep notes. Some RPers I’ve connected with say they keep a note pad or Post-It notes next to their computer. They jot down character traits, snippets of conversation, references for call-backs, etc. But as time goes on—especially if you have more than one character to keep straight—a lot of recycled forests will dry up, and you’re going to have the mounting problem of indexing and being able to find an old note on the fly.

I recommend the note method if you have fewer than five characters, particularly if they’re not closely related. Buy a five-subject notebook like you’d get for school and turn each character into a “subject.” You can even draw a line down the center of the divider pages for a two-column quick-reference where you keep “likes” and “dislikes” or a list of traits that will be a consistent part of your characterization regardless of who you’re RPing with or what story you’re writing. For example, if your character “speaks with an accent” or “swears a lot,” you’ll want to keep those references at the front of your notepad so they’re a consistent reminder for that character. I have a Twi’lek Jedi Knight who happens to be deaf. He reads lips and senses vibrations in the Force, but I have to be careful not to have him respond to sounds or conversations out of his line of sight. “Deaf” is at the top of his character sheet.

ORDER OUT OF CHAOS

If you’re an old-school RolePlayer like me, you probably remember the days of Dungeons & Dragons, pencil-and-paper RP that included a Character Sheet that held information similar to what you find if you tap C to pull up your SWTOR in-game character profile. But, in addition to abilities and technical facts and figures, you might have a section for personality or references to traits related to your character’s race or background. The old pencil-and-paper character sheets you’d buy at a hobby or comic book store were great for keeping information concise because they’d have boxes and lines that kept your pencil scrawls organized. The problem is you’d have to copy everything to a new sheet once you started wearing eraser holes through the paper.

Fortunately, you can accomplish the same thing electronically. Keeping an “e-notebook” not only saves paper and desk space, it’s convenient to have on screen in front of you (either on a secondary monitor or in the background just an alt-tab away). You can use Microsoft Word, Notepad, Open Office, InDesign, or any other program for word processing or note keeping. Open Office is a great example of one you can download for free—if you want something beyond your computer’s built-in note pad—with the capability for organizing tables, columns or charts with boldface, italics or even color-coding. Every word processor I’ve ever used lets you easily find a reference with a simple key stroke that opens a search window (typically Ctrl+F for “find”). Just be sure to be detailed so you can easily locate your references.

I actually use my swtor-life gmail account for all my characters. I created an email for each one and simply save it in my drafts folder. In other words, I wrote an email to myself without hitting “send” so I can just click over to the drafts tab in whatever browser I’m using (wherever I’m using it—even on my phone or Kindle). Until Google suffers an unlikely server disaster, I know my characters are safe. Even so, I periodically copy/paste my drafts onto a word processor and store them on my computer.

The first line includes all the “game info” I need to know, including crafting skills and level. Each of my characters’s “sheets” contains the same queues for easy reference. If another character asks, “Where are you from?” or “What do you do?” I can easily remember that I’m a teacher and that I came from the planet Carida, but as you can see a character sheet allows you to go into greater detail. I only need enough to trigger my own memories and E.U. knowledge to flesh out this character even more. For example, the reference to Spinara Plateau and Carida Academy are enough to remind me that Daelu came from an orphanage on the rogue world until he was adopted by a Bith Jedi. You’ll also notice that I don’t use Qyzen Fess in RP and that I’ve re-named my ship’s droid to make him my own. As Daelu grows in level and gets more companions, I’ll create backgrounds for them as well.

Be sure to use prompts for things like “Quirks,” “Hobbies,” and “Phobias” to add character to your persona, even if your character is a Dark Sith bad ass. My most vile character is a Sith Lord with an extremely nasty disposition. Here’s an example of how his QHP prompts might look:

QUIRKS: Uses the word “indeed” frequently.

HOBBIES: Collects slaves.

PHOBIAS: Bodies of water.

A Sith Lord afraid of water? Why not? Maybe he almost drowned as a child—shoved into a swamp on Hutta and left for dead. Otherwise, I play him as a tough guy with an unstoppable will. Adding a fear or weakness to your character humanizes them and gives them a dimension that comes out in your RP. It makes them a believable character. Consider this: Do you have a cyborg character? Where did the cybernetics come from? How were they injured (or were they born that way) to require artificial enhancements? Does your character have a scar? How did they get it, and did the deep mark on their face lead to a fear of something? Maybe your character was burned in some kind of plasma explosion, so now they have a fear of fire. Something to consider.

CHARTING

A simple way to keep character relationships in order is to create a chart like this:

With twenty characters to keep in order, a chart like this makes it easy for me to follow at-a-glance where all my connections come from and how they’re related.

If you only have a handful of characters, check out the built-in legacy tree on the Legacy tab in-game. BioWare obviously had RolePlayers in mind when they devised this handy reference tool which lets you relate your characters across faction as children or parents, siblings, rivals and more. The only reason I created my own chart is because I needed to refer to more specific connections like acquaintances from a training academy, or former master-slave relations.

KEEPING TRACK OF RP

Ok, so now you have a note system to keep track of your characters’ traits, personalities, history, visited locations, even phobias. How do you keep track of the characters played by other players in-game?

In-Game Notes

The Friends Tab in SWTOR lets you add notes so you can keep track of how you met someone or notes about that person’s personality or their character’s relationship to yours (consider the possibilities of combined legacies and having marriages, siblings, parents or rivals between you and other players).

My notes on the Friends tab look like this: “RP 10/16/13” and that’s it. I have more extensive notes on my computer tied to that date. Here’s how it works:

Out-of-Game Notes

I have a document on my computer that references RP. With twenty characters, all of whom I RP with, you can imagine how complicated and complex the relationships and instances can go. I can go more than a week between playing one character or another, so this guide helps me keep everything straight. Using the search function of my processor will instantly show me what the last RP session was with someone else’s character—or if I even know them at all. For example:

10/2/13 (Wed a.m.) – Meurika, Sanzara’li

Began a business chat with Sanzara’li when his pet Lethan approached. Meur inspected his property, then they talked about possible joint business ventures.

9/30/13 (Mon a.m.) – Elayo, Ventak

They are reunited after being separated for awhile. He gives her a bracelet of emeralds.

9/27/13 (Fri, p.m.) – Meurika, Sanzara’li

Meets Sanzara’li, an imposing slave trader for the Empire. They have several things in common, particularly a taste for blood soup.

9/23/13 (Mon a.m.) – Meurika, Zedra

Meurika returns to Korriban on business and meets an instructor there. Zedra enlists Meur’s help in locating one of her lost students.

(NOTE: Any relation to the characters mentioned above and in-game characters is coincidence. I made them up for this example.)

Meurika’s Friend’s List next to “Zedra” will have the note “RP 9/23/13.” Searching for that date on my RP note document will bring me to the two lines above that will remind me who Zedra is and what Meurika and she did. Likewise, if I search for “Elayo” and see all of that character’s RP dealings, I can see that she received a gift on 9/30. The next time Elayo and Ventak RP together, I can emote her adjusting the bracelet or admiring it in the light. If you use this method of memory-boosting, just be sure to keep it simple. There’s no reason to go into long exposition. You really just need enough to remind you what your character did, with whom, and when.

FAIR WARNING FROM THE GUILTY

My name is MJ and I’m an altoholic.

“Hi, MJ.”

I love my characters. I love their interrelations as well as the histories they share with other player characters. The downside of my massive legacy is that it makes me inadvertently selfish. How often can I RP twenty characters and how deep can their relationships go with others, especially if my in-game time is already limited?

Don’t bite off more than you can chew when establishing relationships with other characters in-game. I’ve been on the receiving end of whispers in-game like, “((Hey! Where have you been? I haven’t seen you on in almost a month!))” to which I have to admit, “((Sorry… I was involved in a story with another character in the other faction)).” Don’t assume that everyone else has as many characters in the pot as you.

One way to keep everyone happy is to be open about your play style. I typically let people know that I may be on another character, invite them to “friend” those names, and shoot me a Tell if they’re interested in RP. I also make sure that I only get involved in deep multi-episodic stories with one or two (at the most) players at a time and give them the priority until our stories have concluded. Likewise, I’ll warn other people I RP with that I may bounce from character to character, and I let them know the hours I’m typically in-game. Above all, I never allow myself to fall into a situation where I have a character “living” on another character’s ship, or vice-versa. Imagine being “stranded” because the other person hasn’t logged in to that character in a long time.

((The RP XP with MJ appears every Friday exclusively here on swtor-life.com. Feel free to contact MJ directly with your RP stories or questions at swtorliferp(at)gmail.com, or follow him on Twitter @MJswtor))

5 Responses to “Keeping It All Together”

Quick question, or not so quick maybe. With multiple characters, especially complex relationships such as your 20 where you inevitably end up having a solution for a lot of problems just by having another of your alts show up, how do you deal with having to character hop while your other character needs to remain there? Say you have to call somebody else who happens to be your alt, but your first character needs to be there too.

And a side question. How do you deal with RP where you need a certain character somewhere where you’re currently RPing as another that’s about to call them (As above) but they loged off on another planet two or three loading screens away? Some people might not think to wait.

The trick to using two characters at once is simple: Avoid it. You should never have the need to “team up” with your characters and someone else, but if the circumstance comes up where you’d have to contact another of your characters with the one you’re currently playing, simply do this:

MYTOON: “I’ll call MYOTHERTOON on holo. Stand by.”

Then you simply pretend to “make a call” to your other character, either speaking both parts or relaying the message. The legacy emote “/holocom” will provide you with an emote, then you simply fill in both parts.

There are clever ways you can dress up your companions to match your characters. My Sith Lord, for example, had a servant that was also another character of mine. I simply dressed the Jaessa companion like my other character. That way I could make it look like the other two were together in the same place.

BTW I so wish I could RP with you sometime. I bought a 60 day non-recurring card yesterday and redeemed it, but it’s probably going to be wasted at this rate. Mom still won’t get me broadband as far this post. I want it for my birthday (28th). Anyway I pretty much expected it to be wasted, and just wanted to time it so I get rewards from Join the Battle and Galactic Starfighter for being subbed. Still though, would be nice to use my time on RP, especially when I have access to all those emotes that only subs get. Maybe next month I’ll bring my client on a flash drive or my phone and go to an Internet Café. I can email you for your times, right?

You’re welcome! I appreciate your feedback and questions. It helps flesh out the column even more.

I’m a full-time sub, so I can’t imagine the trials you and other F2P and Preferred Players face. I know it can be a pain. The good news is that RP requires nothing other than an imagination and the ability to maintain character, and that costs nothing extra.

I’ve RP’d with people who send me /whispers to tell me they can’t /kneel or /wave or /whatever because they’re on the free plan. I tell them no worries and help them feel on par by refraining from using paid or sub’d emotes during our RP. It’s just as easy to say, “/e kneels at the river bank” while actually standing. A good part of RP is suspension of disbelief, after all.

And hey, if you ever want to RolePlay with me, send me an email and let me know your schedule, and if we can’t find time in-game, I’m perfectly cool with MRP (Mail RP) or chatting out characterizations through an email discussion. As you can guess, I can talk for hours and hours about my character, other people’s characters and RP in general.

“Fa doth du mah bonsa” ((It’s in my blood)) 😉

The same goes for anyone else on Ebon Hawk. If you’d like to test out an RP role or characterization technique, hit me up at swtorliferp@gmail. I’d be happy to see what you’ve got.

I’m a pre-launch sub Founder who de-subbed after the 6th paid month, but ever since the game went hybrid I’ve stayed preferred except when it suits me to sub (For F2P launch rewards, sub rewards like Join the Battle, or when I really need the high credit cap). I had been stealing WiFi from March to July, and worked really hard to pay back my guild members for unlocks. A couple weeks before I got cut off from the WiFi I was stealing I got all my unlocks, so I’m pretty comfortable. I can’t imagine what a F2P or preferred with no unlocks feels like. When I came back I felt pretty limited, but it’s really not that bad once the unlock are obtained. Only thing I miss are emotes (Really sad), credit cap, and full access to side content.

Anyway I tend to do that too, but for a different reason. I actually got used to typing all my emotes as text even though some are built into the game. This is because in games like STO very few emotes are acted out by characters anyway. Besides I forum RP so I’m used to writing and describing anyway. Ingame RP I’m still learning, and really enjoy your column.

But yea I’d really love to RP with you, but it might be a while until I can. It’s just that I can’t play SWTOR from home anymore due to having a a soft cap on my data. SWTOR uses hefty amounts of data, so it would eat my highspeed allowance pretty quickly. Not to mention patches. Oh boy.

I enjoy character discussions, and testing my characters on people. I often find my characters have too many holes, and I would love to have chances to develop them so I can fill those holes in. It’s just going to be a while until I can play again. Meantime, I really enjoy your column.